What "weed need" is a space mission!

[Dubslow]

Originally Posted by Uncwilly

Try that Jeff Bezos!

So many people that I talk to can't grasp how much harder it is to do what Space-X is than the Blue Origin folks.

Take a rocket that is separating the second stage at about 80km in altitude (260,000 feet) at a speed of Mach 10, with an ultimate apogee altitude of around 140km.
B-O is vertical only and has peaked at 101 km.
The Falcon first stage does 4 total burns. 2 are need because of the horizontal speed that B-O does not have.

Then stick the landing with less than 30m error on a moving craft that can hold position with only 3m of accuracy that is pitching on the seas.
And the landing legs have to deploy and lock. B-O does not have to have deployable legs.

Elon Musk said that OCISTLY can GPS station keep with accuracy <1 meter at the post launch press conference.

[only_human]

How (and Why) SpaceX Will Colonize Mars
During Friday's launch one of the two commentators had an Occupy Mars shirt on so I went ahead and read about Musk's long-term strategy. This is a lot to read through and it has a slightly hagiographic feel at first but I bet at least some of the people here might finish thinking instead that it is quite visionary.

[retina]

Originally Posted by only_human

How (and Why) SpaceX Will Colonize Mars

Well written and a good read.

[Mark Rose]

Elon tweeted this video, but deleted it not long after, probably due to the foul language.

If you have no conniptions about the f-word, enjoy:



The original "music" video, if you're curious.

[only_human]

Originally Posted by Mark Rose

Elon tweeted this video, but deleted it not long after, probably due to the foul language.

If you have no conniptions about the f-word, enjoy:



The original "music" video, if you're curious.

I liked it very much in this context even though I'm more concerned about profanity than the average bear. I hadn't heard it before but I am waging a fruitless battle to outwait the existence rap music. Linus liked it too:

I'm enjoying the Youtube mixup of the SpaceX CRS-8 first stage landing with Lonely Island's "I'm on a boat" song. Congrats to everybody involved.

I'm not very hip, so the only other time I've heard that song is when somebody in my poker group is mangling it (horribly). I think it works better for Elon Musk, but maybe that is because I'm not losing money.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by only_human

I hadn't heard it before but I am waging a fruitless battle to outwait the existence rap music.

I believe that its spelled with a silent 'c'.

[Dubslow]

A decent bit of the offset from center of the barge was after-cutoff bouncing. https://twitter.com/aallan/status/718851627218808832

[only_human]

That "green" satellite propellant that Nasa has been working on is expected to boosted into space on a Falcon Heavy satellite payload in March next year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Green_...fusion_Mission

The combined benefits of low toxicity and easy open-container handling will shorten ground processing time from weeks to days, simplifying the launching of satellites.

Other potential applications may be feasible:

In addition to its use on lighter satellites and rockets, the fuel's exceptional volumetric storage properties is also being assessed for military uses such as missile launches.

Future 2016 SpaceX Falcon launches

The first Falcon Heavy test flight should be this November.
The next Falcon 9 launch should be April 28th according to the above launch list.

The next SpaceX engine design, essential to Mars methane refueling ambitions is the Raptor.

In January 2016, the US Air Force awarded a US$33.6 million development contract to SpaceX develop a prototype version of its methane-fueled reusable Raptor engine for use on the upper stage of the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch vehicles, which required double-matching funding by SpaceX of at least US$67.3 million. Work under the contract is expected to be completed in 2018, and engine performance testing will be done at NASA's John C. Stennis Space Center in Mississippi.

[fivemack]

Has anyone here actually managed to see a rocket launch? I am sufficiently enthused by the Falcon Heavy that I'm quite tempted to look at the logistics; but Falcon Heavy #1 seems a mission extremely likely to be repeatedly delayed (and has already been pretty repeatedly delayed ...)

Thanks to the Great Mouse I can get to Orlando at a month's notice for £500 or so; I'm not sure how often a mission is substantially delayed within a month of expected launch date, and that's still a lot to pay just to hear an announcer shout 'HOLD, HOLD' at T-7s. Also I'm not quite sure what there is to do in and around Orlando - KSC probably could eat three days, and there is indeed the Great Mouse.

[only_human]

It bothers me that the Falcon Heavy demo flight does not have a commercial customer. So the strongest scheduling pressures are those related to delays of subsequent Heavy flights.

Knowing the payload would give a better idea.

Here is a smart reddit thread from a year ago: Falcon Heavy Demo Flight 1 speculation thread

This year's low energy transit to Mars was in March so I don't expect the demo to make some great statement about private rockets to the Red Planet. The next Trans-Mars injection would be in two years.

The Ariane 6 designed as a commercial competitor to the Falcon 9 has recently cleared some tax and bureaucratic hurdles so that may induce SpaceX to push harder on Falcon Heavy scheduling.
Ariane 6 designers say they’ll beat SpaceX prices on per-kilogram basis

My perspective is that spending time now getting a lot of experience on core recoveries is more sensible before complexifying missions by doubling or tripling first stage core recoveries per flight.

Still seeing 27 Roman Candles burning all at once is definitely worth watching.

edit: (added more smoke)
A New Way to Reach Mars Safely, Anytime and on the Cheap -
Ballistic capture, a low-energy method that has coasted spacecraft into lunar orbit, could help humanity visit the Red Planet much more often

[Dubslow]

Originally Posted by fivemack

Has anyone here actually managed to see a rocket launch? I am sufficiently enthused by the Falcon Heavy that I'm quite tempted to look at the logistics; but Falcon Heavy #1 seems a mission extremely likely to be repeatedly delayed (and has already been pretty repeatedly delayed ...)

Thanks to the Great Mouse I can get to Orlando at a month's notice for £500 or so; I'm not sure how often a mission is substantially delayed within a month of expected launch date, and that's still a lot to pay just to hear an announcer shout 'HOLD, HOLD' at T-7s. Also I'm not quite sure what there is to do in and around Orlando - KSC probably could eat three days, and there is indeed the Great Mouse.

I've mentioned before that I've been to one, and notably posted my own personal video of the December F9 return to launch site historic landing several pages back. My dad lives on the island that Kennedy Space Center is on, which is just to the west of Cape Canaveral. Said island is a solid 30+ km long (depending on how much of the trailing part to the south you count as island, it gets very thin). KSC and wildlife preserves occupy the northern two thirds, while ~35K residents occupy the lower third (and form only a small part of the 550K people in the surrounding metropolitan area; the area is some ~100 km in length, and I'm not real sure of the population density as a function of location in the area).

I visit a couple of times a year, approximately, and my most recent visit happened to correspond beautifully to SpaceX's historic launch.

I'm not real familiar with what there is to do around there, seeing as the total time I've spent there in my life is on the order of a month, with nearly no tourism. Cocoa Beach (which is to Cape Canaveral as residential Merritt Island is to KSC) is a relatively major tourist attraction, though beyond the idyllic beaches it almost surely has nothing that would interest you. Orlando is of course ~100 km west of the coast, and undoubtedly has far more things to do (not least of which is the Great Mouse), though perhaps none of them are as interesting as, say, the KSC Visitors' Center (which I've been to a couple times, including one of their guided tours to the LC-39 observation gantry between the VAB and LC-39A, though obviously that wasn't when there was any sort of rocket around).

If you so desire I could forward any questions you might have to my dad.

Edit: For the record, the December F9 was the second launch I'd been to -- I also saw a Delta IV Heavy launch a few years ago, which was noticeably louder and more powerful than the F9. Seeing as the D IV is ~twice the power of the F9, and the FH is ~twice the power of the D IV, I shudder to think what Space Shuttle, much less Saturn V launches would have been like -- ~eight times an F9 or ~double a FH... For reference, the D IV was like a minor earthquake, where the F9 was really just extraordinarily loud, not quite earthquake level. No video or sound recording system could ever do it justice. Distance was around 17.5 km, see attached (northern point of measure averages LCs-40 and 41; 40 is for the F9, 41 north of it was the Delta IV evidently I misremembered; DIVHs launch from LC-37B). The FH will launch from 39A, which is around ~20 km it seems from my standard viewing point. I'm not entirely sure if there's a possibly better place, or what NASA-sanctioned places you can get to, but I do know that thousands of people line that publicly accessible road I marked for each launch (no doubt more for the FH). My old go-to joke is that there is only one professional spectator sport in Brevard County, and it is rocket launching.



And of course, thousands of other people online have written about watching Florida launches, e.g. https://www.reddit.com/r/spacex/wiki..._the_launch.3F Also https://www.kennedyspacecenter.com/l...ub-policy.aspx (the policy kinda sucks, a lot, IMO)

Edit: The video I posted (first link in this post) nearly exactly identifies my viewing point. Our view of the landing was unfortunately blocked by a building, and Google Maps kindly points out the only such building on the Cape in the second attached image.